The Reconstruction Political Spectrum

Reconstruction was socially unsuccessful because of the Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow Laws, and Segregation. The Ku Klux Klan would threaten, beat, and murder blacks and republicans. They would burn crosses on their raids, and would throw little wooden caskets in the home of the Republican or African American who was being raided. Jim Crow Laws separated the population because, it make it so white people would always have the better out of black people such as, seats on a train, or there American rights would be discriminated on. Jim Crow Laws also made it so blacks would have to go to different schools, different public transportation areas, different schools, and different restaurants.

Andrew Johnson, a southerner himself, believed that the blacks should have no role in the reconstruction. Between 1865 and 1867 Johnson ordered new provisional governors to establish new all white governments, that ruled similarly to the racist confederates before them. Some things did change for the former slaves as Universities and primary and secondary schools were established for them by the Freedman’s Bureau. Now the freedman’s bureau didn’t grant the slaves the one thing they wanted most, land. To the blacks, land was as essential part of truly becoming free.

Black politicians in Southern government were influenced to participate due to access to education and violence against former slaves. The Reconstruction period was a time of radical social and political change as former slaves, recently emancipated by President Lincoln, sought to take advantage of their newfound freedom by pursuing political positions within the new Radical Republican governments and seeking access to education for all blacks. Though they were met with violence, adversity, and injustice, educated black leaders recognized the importance of literacy to uplift their people from long lives of physical labor, and many of these leaders went on to become educators themselves before serving in the Reconstruction government. Aggressive

In the 1870s, southern Democrats began to muster more political power as former Confederates began to vote again. It was a movement that gathered energy up until the Compromise of 1877, in the process known as the Redemption. White Democratic Southerners saw themselves as redeeming the South by regaining power. They appealed to scalawags (white Southerners who supported the Republican Party after the civil war and during the time of reconstruction). More importantly, in a second wave of violence following the suppression of the Ku Klux Klan, violence began to increase in the Deep South.

Both Lincoln and Johnson had different ways to approach Reconstruction. Both did support the Ten Percent Plan. This plan allowed each southern state that were part of the rebellion to return to the Union. Just as long as 10% of their voters would take a loyalty oath and they approve the Thirteenth Amendment to abolish slavery. Johnson wasn’t as moral as Lincoln didn’t have the same political judgement.

The main goal of Reconstruction was to bring the rebel states back into the Union and to help the slaves become a part of society. These goals were achieved but it had both successes and failures. The major successes brought from the Reconstruction were: 1. The reunification of the Union: Reconstruction succeeded in bringing rebel states together. 2.

Once the Civil War ended, many people suffered from weaknesses. The war caused many problems, therefore, causing the need for Reconstruction. Reconstruction was used to fix the majority of problems that the Civil War caused. During Reconstruction, which occurred from 1865 to 1877, many people’s lives were impacted, especially African Americans because many were having to deal with political, economic, and social issues. A political perspective was that African Americans should be given more rights, a social perspective was to allow African Americans to have a normal life, while an economic perspective was that African Americans shouldn’t be allowed to connect with the government.

Separate But Not Equal - How Brown v. Board of Education Changed America Brown v. Board of Education was a court case to desegregate schools. During this time over one-third of states, mostly in the south, segregated their schools by law. Most people don’t know that the lawsuit actually started off as five, in Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, and the District of Columbia. Unfortunately all the lower court cases resulted in defeat (Greenspan 1). The bigger issue was still at hand though, it wasn’t only the schools being segregated, it was everywhere.

As stated in the introduction, the most well-known hate crimes have been against people of the African-American community. The most successful terrorist group that have committed hate crimes against African- Americans in the United States has been the Ku Klux Klan. This group was created in 1865 in Pulaski, Tennessee and is still have many factions throughout the United States. The Southern Poverty Law Center estimated that the Ku Klux Klan has between 5,000 and 8,000 members nationwide.1 Their power has been on its ability to inspire racist ideology.

rallies, they done white sheet clothing with holes cut out for them to see and have a long pointed hood. The membership to this hate group was interesting because it has been known that high ranking people in the government such as councilman, police officers and other government officials. Over the years of this groups existence, there have been numerous leaders who was known as the Grand Wizard. One of them was Hiram W. Evans and he became the Imperial Wizard in the year of 1922. During his reign of being in the most powerful position of this group, membership was known to have been close to well over a few million members (1).

The Civil War was the most destructive battle in American history. The hurricane of a battle lasted for four years and is responsible for 785,000-1,000,000 Union, Confederate, and slave casualties. The battle was fought for the overall emancipation of slaves, and the Union succeeded in fulfilling that goal. You would think that after that war and after slavery was abolished once and for all, everyone would be happy and everyone would join together and sing Kumbaya; however, that's not exactly what happened. The Reconstruction Era was more destructive for slaves than the war itself.